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| November 30, 2008 News |
| Rotax Max Challenge Grand Finals: Prefinal and Final Report |
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History was made for the United States at the final day of action at this year’s Rotax Max Challenge Grand Finals. Over the last few years, the Rotax program within the United States has certainly improved steadily and each year at the Grand Finals the red, white, and blue have continued to challenge the best from around the world. The La Conca International Circuit was host for the event this year and provided a backdrop for some great racing. It will also go down in history as the site where Florida pilot Stuart Marsell earned a third place finish in DD2, the highest ever by an American, while Curtis Cooksey was second in the DD2 Masters division to be the first ever drivers from the United States to stand on the podium at the Grand Finals.
DD2
The DD2 Prefinal was an exciting 16-lap fight between the top three drivers of Pier-Luc Ouellette (Canada), Damien Vuillaume (France) and fourth place starter Ryan Urban (New Zealand). With four official lead changes, the top spot was swapped that many times in the final circuit with defending champion Ouellette coming out on top. Vuillaume was second with Urban third. Stuart Marsell (USA) fought hard to remain inside the top-10 and did so by crossing the line eighth, one spot behind Christophe Boisclair (Canada) who started 12th. American Curtis Cooksey was classified as one of the Masters drivers within the DD2 category, sitting second heading into the main event after a 25th place run, just one spot ahead of Ryan Fowler (USA). Contact put Canadians Scott Campbell and Darren White back to 23rd and 32nd respectively.
Ouellette got a good start at the drop of the green to begin the main event. That would change however as a driver would hit Vuillaume, who then pushed into Ouellette. Leeroy Poulter (South Africa) took advantage of the situation and took command of the field. Ouellette would only fall to second but would engage in a tight battle in the first half. In the second half, he was able to break away and cut into Poulter’s advantage. On the final lap, Ouellette did everything he could to get by Poulter but he would shut the door and beat the defending champ to become the new DD2 world champion. Maik Barten (Netherlands) would cross the line third. Marsell quickly found himself in fourth early on and held on for the remaining laps to finish there.
 | Pier-Luc Ouellette on the podium with winner Leeroy Poulter and Maik Barten - who was penalized to put American Stuart Marsell in the third spot
(Photo: Patrick Moreau) |
Following the race and podium ceremonies, the Rotax officials penalized Barten 10-seconds for a false start, thus moving him back to 12th and putting Marsell to third to record the first ever podium finish by an American. Boisclair would finish in the same position he started, seventh, with Campbell and White running 23rd and 25th.
Cooksey would lead the DD2 Masters category in the first half until relinquishing the spot to Dennis Kroes (Netherlands) to finish second in the category, the first for an American driver, running 27th overall with Fowler crossing the line 28th, one lap down.
Senior
Pole sitter Ben Cooper (United Kingdom) went flag to flag to earn the 16-lap Prefinal victory by three seconds over Hannes V. Asseldonk (Netherlands) and Chris Lock (United Kingdom). Wesley Phillips and Phillip Arscott were the lone Americans to compete on Sunday in the Senior category. The day would however not go as planned. During warm-up, Phillips engine would break, thus needing to get a replacement. The engine however was not the same come Prefinal time and fell back 22nd. Arscott battled hard but would not advance up the order and was set to start 24th in the main event.
Cooper would dominate the feature race to earn the world championship by three seconds over Lock with 2006 Rock Island Grand Prix TaG winner Martin Pierce (Ireland) coming from seventh to stand on the podium not only as the third place finisher, but also the Masters champion at the young age of 32. Arscott had a great run going, running 17th when the last lap signal was shown however he would get shuffled back to 25th at the line. Phillips received a third engine after the replacement was not up to par but the new engine was still not to his liking. He was running 24th on the final lap until a crash put him on the sidelines, classifying him in 31st.
 | American Curtis Cooksey enjoys the DD2 Masters podium in second place
(Photo: BRP-Rotax - soa-design.com) |
Junior
The 12-lap Prefinal would line up the Junior division for the main event later in the day. The race began with a bunch of drivers mid-pack getting sideways and spinning, fortunately everyone was able to continue. Up front, Australia’s Joshua Demaio used the outside line of the front row to lead the field for the first half of the race until Rio Haryanto (Indonesia) overtook the position and went on to the win. American Justin Coplen fell from eighth to eleventh in the opening lap until working up to eighth the next time around. With two laps to go, he would gain another position but would lose that spot on the final circuit to start eighth for the feature. Jesus Rios Jr. (USA) was shuffled back in the first corner skirmish and was 24th on lap one but was able to work back to 17th at the checkered. Canadians Tyler Wheeler and Kevin King also put in great runs up to 20th and 23rd from their 28th and 32nd starting position.
The main event was a wild one with 13 lead changes in the 20-lap race with Facundo Chapur (Argentina) escaping to claim the world championship over the defending champion Kevin Korjus (Estonia) and Paul Fourquemin (France). Coplen would have a fight of his own to stay inside the top-10 however he would come up short to finish 12th. The result was two positions better than his first year at the Grand Finals in UAE last year. Rios fell back to 25th on lap three but climbed his way back to finish 20th in the world for his first visit to the Grand Finals. Wheeler crossed the line 16th but a penalty to another driver would move him up one spot to 15th while King ran behind Wheeler until he was pushed off the track at the far end of the circuit and finished 23rd.
Wrap-up
Following the podium ceremonies, the United Kingdom was awarded the Nations Cup - which totaled the points for one driver in each category for each country - with the Netherlands earning second and Hungary third. For the United States and Canada, both countries continue to show they can run with the best from around the world and with the upcoming 2009 season on the horizon, there is no doubt many Rotaxians around North America will be preparing to earn a spot at the 2009 Rotax Max Challenge Grand Finals…location to be announced soon. |
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